The Hand of Confession – Chapter 136

Volume 5: Days of Applying Makeup to Corpses

Disappearance

The Disappearance of Xiao Qiao

Shen Maomao: “Huh? How can you tell?”

Lou Jingmo: “Hard to say. If you insist on asking, then it’s intuition.”

Shen Maomao: “My apologies.”

Not long after, everyone who had anticipated the meal would be tasteless had already come downstairs, and not a single person was eating.

San Huang said, “Alright, the mortuary makeup artist needs to start working. Today we can go check out other buildings, maybe we’ll find something.”

Shen Maomao looked around but didn’t see Xiao Qiao or Gong Lian, and quickly said, “The other two are missing!”

“Hmm?” San Huang also looked around and said, “Where did they go? Has anyone seen them?”

The middle-aged woman said, “I called the two girls when I got up, but they seemed to still be asleep, so I didn’t call again. They were quite tired, let them sleep a bit more.”

San Huang curled the corner of his mouth: “Didn’t want to wake them, or didn’t want to cause trouble?”

The woman’s expression changed, she glared at him, and said uncomfortably, “Don’t use your own dark thoughts to judge others.”

San Huang, however, stopped arguing with her and instead said to the others, “A few of you, come with me to check upstairs.”

A few people stood up in response, and Shen Maomao also pulled Lou Jingmo to follow. The group returned to the dormitory and stood in front of Room 219, where Xiao Qiao and Gong Lian were staying. San Huang raised his hand and knocked on the door.

There was no response from inside.

San Huang added a bit more force, and the “thud, thud, thud” of the knocking echoed far down the hallway. Even if someone was dead asleep inside, they shouldn’t have been completely unresponsive—except for someone like Shen Maomao.

Finally, everyone realized that Xiao Qiao was likely in trouble. Dao Ba [literally means ‘Scar Face’] following San Huang said, “Step aside, let me try to kick the door open.”

As soon as he finished speaking, a small empty space immediately appeared in front of the door.

Dao Ba tensed the muscles in his leg and kicked the wooden door of the dormitory with a loud bang. Spiderweb-like cracks radiated from the point of impact, spreading continuously toward the edges of the door.

The force of this blow exceeded everyone’s expectations. Shen Maomao recalled the strength she had used when kicking a door and was certain that Dao Ba’s strength was at least five times greater than hers. No wonder he had been able to subdue Wang Liang so easily.

As the saying goes, “One force can overcome ten skills.” Under such absolute dominance of strength, her techniques would be completely useless.

By now, Dao Ba had already delivered a second kick. Another loud bang echoed, and continuous cracks appeared on the door panel, which now teetered precariously, with fragments falling like rain.

Then came the third kick.

The door, which had been barely holding on, finally let out a groan. Instead of shattering, it fell backward as a whole, crashing to the ground with a “boom,” sending up a cloud of dust.

The contents of the small room were now fully visible—two neat little beds with neatly folded quilts, and dust particles dancing in the air. There was nothing else.

Xiao Qiao was not there, and Gong Lian was also missing.

San Huang covered his nose and stepped into the room. He reached out and touched the sheet on one of the beds, saying, “It’s cold.”

This proved that the room’s occupants had either been up for a long time or had never slept at all.

With two people suddenly gone, even though San Huang didn’t care much about their lives, he couldn’t just leave the matter unresolved.

He called everyone back to the cafeteria to discuss a plan. Like marionettes, they obediently followed him downstairs.

Before leaving, Shen Maomao glanced at the wooden door and noticed that the door latch, still attached to the door panel, had completely detached from the door frame and now lay alone on the ground. However, the latch was still in the locked position.

This kind of door could only be locked from the inside. So, who had locked it from within? Could the situation in Xiao Qiao’s room be the same as hers?

“Stop looking,” Lou Jingmo called to her. “Hurry up and follow. Overthinking is useless. Just go with the flow and follow the group.”

Shen Maomao: “…” She thought to herself, so that’s why Lou Jingmo is so obedient to San Huang—it must be because she’s just being lazy, right?!

After returning to the cafeteria, San Huang briefly explained the situation in Room 219 and issued another command: “Put everything else aside for now. First, we need to find them. We must see them alive or dead…”

Before he could finish, a man stood up and retorted, “Is it really necessary to waste time on them? It’s already the third day of the game, and we still have no clues. We’re running around like headless flies. Don’t you feel the urgency of time?”

A chorus of agreement rose from the crowd, and the cafeteria once again erupted into chaos. The scene that had played out countless times was repeating itself.

“Please, everyone, quiet down!” San Huang’s authority was being challenged. He shouted twice, but no one listened. So, he climbed onto a dining table, the fat under his work uniform trembling slightly, and raised his voice even louder: “Please, everyone, quiet down! Listen to me!”

This method of delivering a speech undoubtedly had a better effect. Shen Maomao watched him nervously, afraid he might lose his balance and fall, potentially injuring a few people.

San Huang said, “We are all unfortunate people being toyed with by this game. Are we really going to abandon our teammates so easily? They might still be alive, waiting for our rescue somewhere… Aren’t you afraid they might resent us and seek revenge after death?”

“Surely you’ve all seen what happened yesterday. We could see Gong Lian, but invisible to Xiao Qiao. It’s probably because Xiao Qiao did something to wrong Gong Lian. Do you really want to experience something like that?”

Shen Maomao whispered to Lou Jingmo, “What’s going on with San Huang? I feel like something’s off about him.”

Lou Jingmo replied, “How does he know Xiao Qiao’s name?”

These words hit Shen Maomao like a sledgehammer, bringing back all her memories of the past three days in this game scenario.

Yesterday, Xiao Qiao had called out Gong Lian’s name, so it wasn’t strange that San Huang knew Gong Lian. However, from beginning to end, Xiao Qiao had only introduced herself once, when they had split into two groups and she was walking through the woods with them. After that, she never introduced herself again, and no one else had called her by name.

As she thought more deeply, she began to notice many suspicious points about San Huang.

After the NPC died, San Huang almost completely took over the NPC’s duties. From the initial work arrangements to the sudden tasks last night, everything seemed to be the will of the deceased NPC, but was that really the case?

Shen Maomao fell deep into conspiracy theories, unable to extricate herself, until Lou Jingmo’s voice snapped her out of it: “What are you thinking about? You look like disaster is about to strike.”

She looked up and realized that everyone had already left. Guan Qiwen was also nowhere to be seen, and only the two of them remained in the cafeteria.

“I was thinking…” Shen Maomao stood up, swallowing hard, “San Huang must be very scheming, right?”

Lou Jingmo: “…” What the hell kind of thought process is that?

Shen Maomao asked again, “They’ve all gone to look for them? Should we go too?”

“No need,” Lou Jingmo stood up and walked out. “The group has been split into two, and each group is accompanied by a bunch of ghosts.”

Shen Maomao quickly followed, repeating her question, “Then what about us? Should we go look too?”

Lou Jingmo said, “No need. I know where they are.”

Shen Maomao: “? How do you know?”

Lou Jingmo suddenly stopped walking, looking at her with a half-smile. “Should I take you to see?”

Shen Maomao: “No, no.”

She had already guessed the outcome from Lou Jingmo’s expression. Gong Lian was definitely in Room 102, and as for Xiao Qiao, she was likely there too.

Lou Jingmo added, “Let’s go. I’ll take you to finish the work, and then we can do something else.”

Shen Maomao: “Just the two of us?”

Lou Jingmo: “Do you want to find someone else to play Dou Dizhu [斗地主 | dòu dì zhǔ | a popular Chinese card game]?”

Shen Maomao: “…No, I don’t.”

Wang Liang’s body was taken to Room 104, the makeup room next to Room 102.

—Shen Maomao didn’t know what this kind of room was called in a funeral home. “Makeup room” was just a casual name she gave based on its purpose.

Standing at the door of Room 104, her eyes kept involuntarily glancing to the side, as if she felt Gong Lian and Xiao Qiao were standing there watching them.

Lou Jingmo pulled open the iron door, and a wave of icy air rushed out, making Shen Maomao feel uneasy.

“I feel like this cold air isn’t normal…” She shrank behind Lou Jingmo, trembling.

Lou Jingmo said indifferently, “The freezer must be broken.”

Shen Maomao: “…I’m young, but don’t try to fool me.”

Lou Jingmo curled the corner of her mouth: “How could I?”

Shen Maomao: “…” How could you not!

Lou Jingmo slightly stepped aside to make room at the doorway and leaned forward, making an inviting gesture: “After you.”

Shen Maomao suddenly thought of an idiom—Inviting you into the jar [请君入瓮 | qǐng jūn rù wèng | meaning to trap someone in their own scheme].

She walked in, looking back every few steps, while Lou Jingmo leaned against the door with her back, seemingly ready to keep watch for her.

Feeling somewhat reassured, Shen Maomao quickened her pace and walked over to the cabinet where the body was stored. She unzipped the body bag.

Inside was a very intact corpse. If it weren’t for the pale, frozen face, Shen Maomao might have thought he was just asleep.

She turned to look at Lou Jingmo: “Lou-jie, you lied! He wasn’t split in half at all!”

“Oh?” Lou Jingmo raised an eyebrow. “Then did the Yaksha cut off its own foot, leaving the blood at the door?”

Shen Maomao: “…” Right, so what’s going on?

Lou Jingmo added, “Hurry up and do the makeup. The temperature seems to be dropping.”

“Oh, oh,” Shen Maomao responded, not daring to waste any more time. She quickly and skillfully took out the makeup tools from the cabinet, rolling up her sleeves to begin her work.

She first applied a layer of powder to Wang Liang, but then felt it looked too pale, so she added a bit of blush.

Lou Jingmo watched the scene in the room with a somewhat strange expression.

After a while, Shen Maomao clapped her hands: “Done!”

Lou Jingmo: “…Seriously, aren’t you afraid he’ll come looking for you in the middle of the night?”

Shen Maomao’s hands, holding the makeup kit, trembled. She quickly put down the kit and raised four fingers, swearing solemnly, “I swear to heaven, even if I were to do my own makeup, I couldn’t achieve this effect. This is my best work.”

As she swore, she kept glancing at Wang Liang, clearly speaking to him.

Lou Jingmo couldn’t bear to look. No wonder she had never seen Shen Maomao wear makeup—probably because after applying it, Shen Maomao wouldn’t need to go out anymore, so in the end, it was better not to bother.

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